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Message from the President

An Important Piece of America

President Colin G. Campbell

The Colonial Williamsburg Foundation is not immune to today’s challenging economic environment and must adjust to new circumstances. Maintaining eighteenth-century Williamsburg in perpetuity as a source of hope and inspiration requires faithful and prudent stewardship. Despite the turmoil in the nation and world, I have every reason to be proud of Colonial Williamsburg today and to be confident that this will always be a place where the future may learn from the past.

In 2008, instability on Wall Street and Main street damaged consumer confidence and curtailed discretionary spending. That in turn hurt our ticket sales and our conference, leisure, and product businesses. Unfortunately, it appears that the economic slowdown may challenge us deep into 2009, and perhaps beyond.

In this uncertain time, Colonial Williamsburg’s firm goal is to maintain quality programming and superior guest experiences in a setting where, more than 230 years ago, other Americans faced and overcame worse adversity. Our commitment to today and to tomorrow, to sustaining success, is evidenced by the first reconstruction in fifty years of an eighteenth-century structure on Duke of Gloucester
Street—Charlton’s Coffeehouse—by the celebrations of thirty years of the African American interpretive program, and the seventy-fifth anniversaries of the reconstructed Governor’s Palace and Capitol.
We are, as well, advancing our exceptional outreach programs, museum exhibitions, and the popular Revolutionary City. Our achievements are recognized by the
support of individuals and institutions, and the attention paid by newspapers and broadcasters.

My colleagues and I understand well that this national treasure must be a fiscally sound treasure; that
means we must be a smaller, leaner organization. The
workforce is the biggest item in the operating budget,
and it has been resized to reflect resources. We have
consolidated divisions and departments, reduced hours
for some hourly employees, and eliminated positions
filled and unfilled, from officers and directors to the front lines.

Such adjustments are difficult but essential to protect the foundation and all it represents to our country—explained as succinctly as
it can be, perhaps, by a public service announcement
now being televised across the country. The narrator
is award-winning actor and producer Tom Hanks, who
filmed some of the Home Box Office miniseries John
Adams in the Historic Area.

John Adams shows the complexities of the
eighteenth century, when heroes were still human
and not yet rendered in marble. That goes
to the heart of what we try to do, to give
guests insight into what it meant to live
here, an eighteenth-century town that
persisted in tough times. The program,
winner of thirteen Emmys, gave our
mission a boost.

The public service announcement
opens at Great Hopes Plantation with
a farmer at his plow, which represents the American Dream, and turns
through images of a Geddy foundryman pouring metal
from a crucible, which represents American ingenuity; cabinetmakers working wood, which represents
American craftsmanship; a Courthouse of 1770 trial,
which represents American justice; preacher Gowan
Pamphlet before a congregation of slaves, which represents American perseverance; and Thomas Jefferson
standing with other patriots outside the Capitol.

In a voice-over, scene-by-scene, Mr. Hanks says,
“The American dream. American ingenuity. American
craftsmanship. American justice. American perseverance. And the very idea of America itself.”

And at the end, Mr. Hanks appears on camera and
tells the audience directly: “Colonial Williamsburg is
an important piece of America everyone should experience.”